Patents

Patents protect new, useful, and non-obvious inventions

These inventions can be new products or new methods and processes. Our firm focuses primarily on patents in the area of chemistry, pharmaceuticals, and biotechnology. We have handled patent protection for everything: from new drugs for cancer and schizophrenia, to new toothpaste formulations, to new kinds of chocolate, and much more. We regularly represent start-up biotech companies, as well as multinational pharmaceutical and consumer product companies.

Most of our firm’s business involves drafting, filing, and prosecuting patent applications. We handle patent filings directly with the patent office in the U.S., and we work with our network of foreign patent agents to obtain patent protection in countries around the world.

All of our attorneys and patent agents have degrees in chemistry, biology, or biochemistry. Some have doctoral degrees and/or have worked at major pharmaceutical companies. All have taken and passed the examination to practice before the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). The attorneys have law degrees and have also passed a state bar examination.

We have many years of experience in prosecuting patent applications before the USPTO, and where necessary, appealing cases to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, to federal district court, and to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. We have recently handled several appeals from the USPTO to district court, and to the Federal Circuit, involving calculation of patent term adjustment, which is particularly important to pharmaceutical companies. We have also represented clients in complex proceedings before the patent office, such as interferences, reissues, re-examinations, and inter partes review (IPR).

We bring a practical business perspective to our work

Many of our attorneys, including Mike Straher and Tom Hoxie, have worked at senior positions in corporate patent departments or research departments. Tom Hoxie, for example, has experience as an expert witness in a number of cases, where he has testified not only about pharmaceutical patent matters, but about ordinary and customary licensing practices in the pharmaceutical industry. We are familiar with drug development and approval processes, and we can make sure that your patent strategy is coordinated with your regulatory strategy.

We can help large and small companies to develop cost-effective strategies to protect their chemical, pharmaceutical and biotechnology inventions, while avoiding infringing on other parties’ patent rights. We can help investors in determining whether a target company has strong intellectual property protection for its products or has exposure to third party claims of infringement. In addition, we can negotiate and implement agreements with employees, consultants, and third parties to protect your intellectual property and to acquire, assign, or license intellectual property rights as needed. We have the expertise to protect your intellectual property and enforce your rights, even if it means going to court.